


listen, learn, love

by SilverMoonT



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Canon Compliant, Established Relationship, Happy Ending, Light Angst, M/M, Post-Time Skip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-16
Updated: 2020-12-16
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:00:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28116594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverMoonT/pseuds/SilverMoonT
Summary: Kita thinks Atsumu is easy to read, but Atsumu doesn’t speak and Kita looks at him."Are ya feelin’ homesick?"
Relationships: Kita Shinsuke/Miya Atsumu
Comments: 14
Kudos: 105





	listen, learn, love

**Author's Note:**

> implied: sunaosa

Kita recognizes the smile he sees.

"Yer smile assures me that luckily, you’re not that stressed."

He finds it easy to detect such gesture of happiness when the face that is currently holding said expression tends to be serious.

Osamu shakes his head before a chuckle escapes his lips. "Can't I smile, Kita-san?" He asks before turning the cap on his head and folding his arms, the movements of the day accentuating muscles that have gone from spiking balls, sometimes even receiving, blocking, and setting them, to getting used to molding perfect triangles of rice.

"I know ya, Osamu, you can't fool me."

Kita allows himself to express those words because he believes they evidence nothing but the truth. Former teammates, co-workers, certainly family. He knows that the smile on Osamu's face is not a mere coincidence in the same way that Osamu is aware that just as Kita has told him, he can’t fool him.

For the same reason, Osamu rests his arms on the counter as he crosses one foot in front of the other, and taking advantage of the fact that they are the only ones in what he can proudly consider, his future local shop, he accepts, "Rin said he will come back next week." He shrugs, happiness not leaving his facial features. "Just excited, that's all."

Kita smiles. "How is he?"

"Fine, making people's lives impossible I assume, well, I'm sure of that. Still fightin' with me and 'tsumu on twitter." Kita laughs when he hears him. He is glad that the three still keep in touch despite not having the possibility of seeing each other every day. "Y'know, talkin' 'bout the demon, well, yer demon, he's coming back tomorrow, you know that, right?"

Usually Kita would smile and therefore Osamu too, since if Kita knows the motives behind his gesture, then the same happens vice versa; but on that occasion Kita only chooses to lift one of the corners of his mouth and lower his eyes towards the wood of the counter, pretending that the brown color of it is an interesting sight, missing the look that Osamu casts at him.

"I know."

Without hesitation, Osamu says, "I'll set him off to ya."

Kita looks at him. "And here I was thinkin' that you actually miss yer brother." He expresses, pretending not to notice the good mood that accompanies Osamu every time he and Atsumu end a video call.

Osamu lets out a sigh and Kita believes that the years pass by as the moments to continue knowing each other increase. A sigh can mean tiredness, a trace of frustration.

"You won't hear me sayin' it out loud." Osamu decides to start his sentence with those words because it’s true that he will never allow himself to pronounce words that indicate that he misses his brother's presence, no matter if he kicks the top bunk out of habit sometimes. "But he's been, I dunno, kinda distant."

Kita doesn’t decorate his face with a full smile since his phrase is not a surprise.

Hyogo and Osaka are only forty-five minutes apart, a short time that can be passed by with a playlist of distracting music, but with volleyball practice, tournaments, the farm, and the fact that their jobs take time and effort, less than an hour turns into days, and those days, into weeks, sometimes, even months. Kita doesn't count the days since the last time he saw Atsumu. He thinks it's unnecessary and doesn't make sense, it only fills his chest with a nostalgic feeling. He prefers to count the days once Atsumu announces that he will come back.

Tomorrow, he comes back.

Not days, hours. And yet, he is neither smiling nor certainly anxious, because instead of an unnecessary amount of emojis, Atsumu has only written words, and just as it’s easy for him to detect when Osamu replaces his seriousness with a smile, in the same way he knows how to understand when Atsumu chooses to change his attitude.

"I think some time with ya will make him feel okay." Osamu adds, and this time, Kita does smile.

"So you do care about him."

Osamu thinking that it will do Atsumu good to spend time with him makes Kita happy, since Osamu knows what’s best for his twin and it means that Osamu trusts him, but he can only wonder, why does Atsumu need to be okay? He is not?

"I dunno what you're talkin' about, Kita-san."

Kita smiles, but, "I agree, he’s been kinda distant."

Osamu shrugs. He doesn’t know what to say, and therefore agrees, since when in doubt, agree with Kita. Kita thinks how dire the situation must be if neither he nor Osamu know what’s happening.

Atsumu doesn’t tend to hide.

He is loud, shows his emotions with easiness, gets excited in a matter of seconds.

Kita takes advantage of the fact that Osamu has left the doors of the shop open to get up and rest one of the sides of his body against them. It’s late, and the stars don’t decorate the sky as the clouds have hidden them. Maybe a storm is coming, and Kita can't decide if it's because he's hugging himself after a breeze caresses his skin, or because Atsumu will certainly be back tomorrow.

* * *

Kita is used to looking.

Watching over his siblings, his former teammates, the fields. Looking is important because it implies visualizing details, colors, features; it signifies being attentive and paying attention. And now, this time with one side of his body against one of the columns at the back of his house, once again, Kita is looking.

With a hoodie that is not his, black and gold hugging him because he has learned to love and cheer for those colors, he watches the clouds in the sky. Blue and gray patches intermingle, not giving the possibility of deciding if it will rain or not, if it’s better to stay inside or outside. Kita is used to being at the back of his house, vines around him while he looks out over his field.

But now, crops are not the only thing he sees.

He sighs and brushes his lips with his fingertips. Traces of Atsumu remain intact, a welcoming kiss and a hug are now routine. Lips that exclaim emotions and express a lot with the help of words, had certainly remained forming a line or a faint smile.

A pressure against his leg makes him lower his head and he smiles when he finds his dog looking at him. He strokes her golden fur, and without hesitation, he finally says, "Go annoy him."

As if she understands, his dog doesn’t hesitate to listen to him after jumping the few steps and moving until he reaches Atsumu. Lying in the middle of the field, turning into one more detail that Kita has become used to looking at, Atsumu complains once the dog doesn’t hesitate to lie on his stomach.

Kita laughs and he moves too.

"You’re so heavy! I'm not gonna hug ya, you're always tryin' to steal my man away!" One bark is enough for more words to be added, "'kay, fine."

Kita laughs without interrupting the moment that Atsumu and his dog share as the first caresses the animal's head, his dog already very comfortable on his stomach.

His house is big, the fields are extensive. The idea of having a dog had come up simply because, just, why not? His days are busy and he respects the number of hours of sleep for a good rest, but when Atsumu is not there, Osamu is also busy, and the rest of his friends follow their own agendas, having company in the form of golden fur and a wagging tail doesn't sound bad.

He decides to kneel on the grass, not caring if his gray sweatpants get stained because he's used to it. He believes that Atsumu hasn’t thought much about allowing his body to use that surface as a mattress, since probably the pink color of his t-shirt will show that he has chosen to lie down, while his black sweatpants will hide the same.

Atsumu looks at him and Kita thinks it’s a pity that the day is not sunny, although that doesn’t mean that despite Atsumu's pupils not clearing up in natural light, their gazes meeting always implies the following of a set of equal smiles.

"You're tanned, I can see it with the natural light now."

Kita smiles upon hearing him and doesn't ask questions about his words. He opens the door, Atsumu cuts the distance, and they hug. Repetition, habit. Details are lost at first glance when the important thing is not to look, but to feel. Hugging each other, keeping their arms around each other.

He believes that Atsumu sees the tan on his skin that his hoodie leaves visible, and therefore, instead of asking how he can say those words if he has a hoodie on, since his face also has a slight pinkish hue, he says, "And you’re pale with all the time you spend practicing indoors."

Atsumu wrinkles his nose at his sentence and Kita smiles. "What are you doin’ here?" He adds, "The mosquitoes will bite ya."

"My blood ain’t sweet, Shinsuke."

"Maybe they guide themselves by image first and yer sweet."

Atsumu closes his eyes to hold a proud yet shy smirk and then looks at him again. "You don't need to flatter me, I'm already yers."

"You’re avoidin’ my question." Kita says, but he knows that applying pressure is not the right way to behave with Atsumu, so instead of asking a different question with the same intentions, he brings his hand to his cheek to give him a light caress with his knuckles. "I mean it."

He doesn’t need the help of natural light or sunny rays to visualize the doubt in Atsumu's eyes. He is hesitating, and with his next words he decides to keep avoiding his question, "Protect me from the mosquitoes then!"

The dog barks when Atsumu's dramatic attitude makes an appearance in the way he turns his face to rest one hand on his forehead and the other arm stretched out on the grass, and Kita laughs because just as Atsumu can be persistent and stubborn, so can he.

He moves to sit cross-legged behind him, and Atsumu doesn't need words to mold himself into his space after laying his head against his torso and his arms on his thighs. The dog moves with them, but Kita scolds her.

"Don’t do that." He says when he sees her eating the flowers around them, and the dog leaves them to later settle next to them.

Atsumu laughs and strokes the dog’s head, knowing what it feels like to be scolded by Kita from experience, until he barely tilts his head when he feels movement in his hair, and finds Kita leaving petals on it.

"Ya leavin’ petals full of drool in my hair?"

Kita laughs while Atsumu looks forward again because he knows the answer.

"I am." He replies, not commenting on his new hair color because he's waiting for Atsumu to do it himself.

The trick with Atsumu is to wait.

He knows how to do it, Atsumu does too.

The relationship between the two didn’t begin when the two were still wearing the same uniform and walking through the same corridors, but later.

Kita with his studies, Atsumu with his captaincy, the foundations were laid but not developed, the signals were clear but not voiced out loud. It started with, _"I know you know a team wants me. And that team is in Osaka, but, I like ya."_

And what was Kita supposed to do but say, _"I like ya too.”_

Love is not easy but it is long lasting, and luckily for them, mutual too.

Atsumu demonstrates, expresses incessantly. His joy through enthusiastic smiles and his inability to stay still. His anger that turns into serious looks and a grim expression. And his sadness, evidenced in the lack of a smiling gesture on his face, a lower tone of voice, and the absence of his characteristic personality.

Kita thinks Atsumu is easy to read.

But still, now with white petals interspersed with the blonde platinum of his locks, Atsumu doesn’t speak and Kita looks at him, taking advantage of the absence of words to leave one of his arms over his chest and his other hand on his cheek to caress his jaw.

"I feel like I can avoid thinkin’ here."

Always, Atsumu ends up assuring him that sooner or later, little by little and slowly, he feels comfortable with him.

"You think?"

Atsumu pouts upon hearing him. "Shinsuke." Kita smiles and leaves a kiss on his forehead as compensation, making Atsumu replace his expression with a smile and thus keep him smiling.

"I understand ya, I get easily distracted." Spending his days under the sky acting as his personal roof allows him both to find himself alone with his thoughts and to get away from them. "Something in particular you don't want to think about?" He asks. "You have certainly been quiet."

"Seein’ ya leaves me speechless."

His not-so-honest sincerity gets Kita to flick his fingers against the skin where he had previously left a kiss.

"The mosquitoes will eat ya alive if ya keep sayin’ those things."

Atsumu shakes his head whimsically. "You would miss me too much if that happened."

"I would." Agreement is demonstrated. "I do."

He misses Atsumu.

He misses him because, _"Shinsuke! You live alone and you still can't cook?"_ is not what he hears when Atsumu is in Osaka. He misses him when the mornings get colder but there is no reason to hide under the covers as there’s no body to cling to, when at night the couch feels too big even though his dog always chooses to jump to settle next to him. He misses him when the absence of hugs around his waist is even noticeable for his dog, because she stays close to him when Atsumu returns to Osaka. He misses him, when he meets and talks with Osamu, but he can only think of dyed hair and a bigger smile, a louder attitude.

Atsumu flexes his arms to offer him one of his hands, and Kita doesn’t hesitate to interlock his index finger with his.

"Don'tcha think it's unfair?" Atsumu asks him. "Osaka isn't far from here, but we don't see each other as often as we would want to."

"I think it’s unfair that you know it’s unfair, and yet you keep on ignoring my question. What's happening with ya?"

"I don't want to ruin our time together."

"I want you to trust me to tell me how you feel."

Atsumu tilts his head so he can look at him with the beginning of a frown. "I do trust ya."

Kita gently tugs on his still joined fingers to show him that his gestures and his silence indicate different decisions. "So?"

The brown of Atsumu's gaze is lowered.

"It's stupid."

Kita stops holding his finger with his to rest one cheek on his head and thus hug him, getting Atsumu to feel comfortable in his arms again, accommodated on his legs.

"Tell me, please."

Sometimes it's easy to fall into the web of thoughts that imply that Atsumu is always happy and that his smile is forever genuine, but Kita wants Atsumu to think of him as Osamu trusts that he will. A person with whom Atsumu will feel better, since he feels better when he is with Atsumu and he wants that feeling to be mutual.

"I want to go back in time."

Kita straightens up as soon as he hears him and an expression of obvious confusion takes over his face. The petals fall as Atsumu moves to pull away from him and sit cross-legged next in front of him, their knees almost brushing. He doesn't look at him when he leaves one of his elbows on his thigh to rest his cheek on the palm of his hand, and he continues to look down even though he leaves the other hand between them with his finger extended.

Kita hooks his index finger with his, again without hesitation.

"I want to go back in time." Atsumu repeats. "When I was captain, when I was here with a team that I felt comfortable with, with my brother. Close to ya. Or even earlier, when you were captain and Aran-kun was my teammate. I want to go back."

Kita believes that Atsumu is the storm coming because his silence represents the beginning of it, that annoying and fine drizzle that makes you blink, while his words are the thunder that at that moment resounds over them.

"You don't like Osaka?" He decides to ask him.

It's not the first year that he has to get used to living forty-five minutes away from Hyogo, but the second, so Kita chooses to move forward through questions.

"Gin and Oomimi-san are there but I don't know." Atsumu shrugs and shakes his head so as to put his mouth against his hand and murmur.

"What?"

Atsumu straightens up and finally looks at him. "I was benched, okay? I'm in a bad mood cuz I was toss onto the bench. And I don't like it, I don't like it at all. Best high school setter, powerhouse school. I have everything and they send me to the bench. Last year I was... fine with it because I was new, but this year is already my second year. And I don't like it, I don't like it, and I don't like—"

Kita covers his mouth with his hand.

He blinks, several times while trying to process all the information that Atsumu just expressed in an outrageous way. But Atsumu leaves his hand on his and Kita agrees to stop covering his mouth.

"I wanted to tell ya that I was chosen to play, not that I was benched. I don't know, I feel like not playing doesn’t give sense to the fact that I miss Hyogo every day."

Kita bites his lower lip because he finally understands him, and for the same reason he leaves his hand on his cheek, one corner of his mouth lifting up when Atsumu leans into the contact.

There is so much he wants to say, so much he wants to assure him, but for him, the most important thing is, "Does the team treat you well?"

"Yeah. One of them, Meian-san, lives near here so we talk sometimes, and ah, I told ya that Bokkun is my teammate, but, I dunno, they are all older than me. And, I just, I don't know, maybe I'm bein’ immature, and I, I just don’t know."

"Are ya feelin’ homesick?"

Perhaps the previous year didn’t happen after Atsumu being full of adrenaline and the desire to change his surroundings, joining a professional team and meeting a new world. While perhaps this year, already settled, he remembers which region he prefers.

They both decide to stay with their hands together in the middle of them. Atsumu looks at their fingers, Kita looks at him.

"I dunno."

"Do you think that being on the bench is a bad thing?"

The reality is that Atsumu is used to shining, the extraordinariness of his passes and moves gifts him the chance of being bathed in gold. Both as captain and setter at the time, and still as a setter, his habit is to stay in control, to be the tower. And now, for the first time, the focus is not on him.

"It isn't. You were on the bench and you were my best captain. It isn't, I'm just saying I don't like it."

Kita smiles because he knows the answer to his next question.

"Why?"

"I want to play."

Kita thinks he has fallen in love with Atsumu because it's hard not to. He is not malicious and his decisions are based on the passions that are part of him. He moves out of love, or rather, love moves him. He plays because he is in love with volleyball. Kita knows that he can't be jealous. He loves that Atsumu loves.

Atsumu doesn’t like being on the bench not because he thinks he is better than the others, because he doesn’t deserve it or because he is sure that the court is his only personal space, but because he wants to play, set the ball for the rest of the players, because the court is his territory, and because he loves volleyball.

"Do you think that if you play with people that you still don't know completely, right now you can give them the best tosses?"

Atsumu forms a line with his lips.

"No, because I don't know them a hundred percent."

Kita chooses to let go of his hands to rest them on his cheeks, and Atsumu looks at him when he strokes his cheekbone with his thumb.

"Yer problem is that you don't stay still."

Atsumu frowns. "I am still n—"

"I mean it."

Atsumu doesn't follow the world, he gets the world to follow him. He forces you to be at his level, to want to be better because staying still is not an option. "You always go on, and move forward, and I respect that. I admire ya for that."

Not always natural light is what makes the hue of Atsumu's pupils shine.

"But sometimes you have to pause, stop."

Pausing means taking a break and then moving forward with more energy, not braking for an infinite amount of time.

"Holding on to the past is wrong, and thinking only about the future doesn't make sense. Do you want to know why? Because that way you’re losing the present you’re living, or rather, missing."

Daily effort, living day by day, creating a routine that helps you carry out processes which results will appear sooner or later is as important as the consequences themselves.

"Being on the bench helps ya see yer teammates, the dynamics between them." Experience accompanies Kita’s words. "You learn by watching and you always want to try what sounds cool to ya." He mentions mimicking him, and gets Atsumu to smile. "So why are you so desperate? You hafta learn first."

"But I already know how to play volleyball."

"Do you think you have reached yer full potential? That you are the volleyball player you want to be and that there is absolutely nothing else you can learn?"

Kita stops keeping his hands on his cheeks to see Atsumu struggle with himself. He thinks about his words and knows what his answer is.

"No."

Atsumu believes that it’s impossible to run out of things to learn about. Passes, serves. Plays, strategies. There is always something to see, look for, and find.

"Is it selfish of me? I just want to play." He adds.

Kita smiles and he is the one to leave his hands between them for Atsumu to take.

"I think you’re the most selfless person I have ever met." He declares.

Atsumu wants to play just to play. Nothing less, nothing more.

Wonderful plays or not, he doesn’t seek for his name to shine, but that through his passes, his players, the team, he can achieve the highest place. He gets to be the focus without looking for it, while at other times acclaiming the spotlight for him.

"Sometimes you hafta stop, take a breath, and then keep going. If you go on and on, without resting, without taking a pause, you will run out of air."

Atsumu lets out a sigh. "I wanna play. I wanna play against Aran-kun and Sunarin. I wanna give 'samu and ya my jersey. I wanna play, I wanna play, I wanna play."

Kita smiles because Atsumu moving his legs while speaking implies not that he has already returned to being himself, since Atsumu is also allowed to have his low moments, but that he remembers who he is and what drives him ahead.

"Reserve that energy to watch, learn, and win. Can you go back to the past? No. What do you gain by thinking about the future? Nothing. Give yerself time. Breathe."

"I can’t." Atsumu assures him, his typical smile again installed on his face. "You take my breath away."

Kita raises both eyebrows and Atsumu laughs.

He laughs loudly and without limits, assuring himself that he had made a good decision by choosing to return to Hyogo for a few days. It’s true that he misses his home, and that many times he wishes to go back in time, but talking to Kita, with their hands together, reminds him that the present is just as important.

Kita smiles upon seeing him and Atsumu holds a broad smile. He still has a long way to go, a path not free of obstacles because playing without progressing doesn’t make sense. Having fun means trying new plays, new techniques, and new strategies. Decorating his face with a proud smile when the ball falls on the other side of the court after making a different, unexpected pass.

If he improves, so does the team. But the reality is, that in the same way, he improves when the team does. And that is why volleyball is not an individual sport.

"I assume that this was a crisis, then?"

Kita looks at the blonde platinum color of his locks and Atsumu shakes his head as if the color alone is not apparent.

"'samu sent me a text sayin' he stopped dyeing his hair. I wanted a change too."

Once again Kita lets go of his hands to this time trace meaningless paths through his locks. "It doesn't look bad on ya, better than that mustard thing you had." He laughs, and although Atsumu groans, he closes his eyes and smiles as Kita strokes his hair.

The details are not only to look at, but also to feel for oneself.

"I miss ya too." Atsumu says, opening his eyes. "I didn't say it before."

Kita opens his mouth but his dog barking cuts him off. And then he feels a drop on his arm, and another on his leg. He lifts his gaze to the sky to find it as gray as blue.

"What do you think if we go inside since it's cold, and we don’t miss each other anymore?" He proposes to Atsumu after lowering his head. "It's raining."

He takes advantage of having his hands on his hair to attract his face to his and leave a kiss on his forehead. Atsumu smiles as Kita gets up to go back to the house, followed by his dog.

Atsumu stands up and lifts his head towards the sky, blinking as the drops slide onto his skin. He thinks Kita is right, he's always right, and he's already pale from practicing without leaving the gym. He's been crestfallen lately because being the team's main setter and thus having more opportunities to play is what he wants. He wants his brother to watch him play, he wants to imagine Kita watching the game on television, with the dog by his side.

He lowers his head and follows the same path as Kita but stops before taking shelter from the rain that is now making his clothes stick to his body. Just like Kita has told him, he has to slow down.

He breathes, and smiles.

"Shinsuke!"

Kita turns around, and Atsumu stretches his hand out to him.

He thinks it’s understandable that people seek to get under roofs when it rains, even though the drops are nothing more than water. But at that moment a ray of sunlight continues to illuminate the fields.

Kita looks at his hand and then at him.

"We will be sick tomorrow."

"Don't think about the future, think about the now!" Atsumu laughs happily when Kita narrows his eyes because he knows he is using his own words against him.

"You won't be able to train once you come back if you're sick." Kita crosses his arms.

"I won't be able to train if I can't focus cuz the love of my life is not comin' with me right now." Atsumu sees the dog shaking her head between them, following the sound of their voices, and he whistles, getting the dog to jump the steps to go with him, and Kita allows his face to be consumed by an expression of offense. "Come on! She's with me already!"

"Bubble! You betrayed me!"

The dog barks.

"I can’t believe you called yer— our dog Bubble."

"Wh—How did you want me to call her? Tofu hamburger?"

Both laugh at the mention of those words.

"We could have had two dogs, Tofu and Tuna!" Atsumu exclaims between laughs.

Kita uncrosses his arms as he approaches the end of the porch. He think it's a bad idea considering it's raining heavily, that the path they will trace once they enter the house will be marked with water, and that he hasn’t left towels near the door. But Atsumu gives him his best smile.

"You're crazy, Atsumu!"

"Just for ya, Shinsuke!"

Kita thinks Atsumu is crazy, while he considers himself the most normal person for being in love with him.

The drops slide off the tan of his skin when he stops being under the roof and chooses to take another kind of refuge after his hand meets Atsumu's.

It's a habit, they listen each other to give in.

Their lips also meet until the dog barks and they both laugh when she starts running around them.

They may get sick or just need a hot bath.

They dance in the rain, their hands together when Atsumu leads him into a spin and Kita avoids bumping into Bubble.

Kita understands that Atsumu is a storm, a sunshower because rain may fall but the sun is still shining.

Perhaps it was a good decision because a ray of sunlight is still present, and they don’t always have the opportunity to laugh with droplets caressing their skin, or a bad decision because their clothes are wet as well as their sneakers.

It doesn’t matter.

Living the present side by side is the most important detail.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
